Never play Emmaus field hockey trivia with Sue Butz-Stavin. You’ll lose. Badly.

Emmaus downed Parkland 7-1 in the season opener for both teams. Emmaus isn’t known for giving up many goals and usually doesn’t allow a goal until much later in the season. The question was, when was the last time Emmaus gave up a goal in their opener?

“Against Parkland years ago, when Marty [Romeril] was coaching, ‘95; Around ‘95,” answered Butz-Stavin without hesitation. “We played up at Parkland and Kelly Snyder was making her debut in the goal cage.”

Now we know.

The one goal that was allowed by sophomore goalkeeper Claire Nielsen Friday could have been waved off. The ball was much higher than the allowed 18-inches. With her team up by five goals at the time of the goal, Butz-Stavin didn’t challenge the goal.

“It’s a wonderful start for us,” she said. “I think we did a great job commanding ball control and positioning and I thought we put a lot of pressure on Brie [Barraco], their goalkeeper, who is outstanding. We just had to hang in there and keep firing. We had some good finishes and some good combinations.”

Maddy Orobono opened the scoring just under nine minutes into the game off of a corner. Two minutes later, Kayla Kisthardt made it 2-0 off of an assist from Meredith Sholder. Maddy Dorn, Leah Zellner and Sholder all added first-half goals to put the Hornets up 5-0 at halftime.

Sholder added two second-half goals to give Emmaus a 7-1 margin, outshooting the Lady Trojans 34-3 in the game.

“The other girls have to come through in scoring, and Mere [Sholder] also has that great vision to be able to pass off, so it’s a whole team contribution,” said Butz Stavin. “We don’t want to rely on one individual, because it’s not going to work.”

Emmaus could have tallied a number of other goals if not for Barraco, who blocked shot after shot. Emmaus had to be patient, use some skilled passing and just keep firing away to get the goals that it did.

“I wasn’t keeping stats, but I’m sure she had 25 to 35 saves today,” said Butz-Stavin. “She’ll be doing that all season long and let Parkland hang around. They’ve got some kids with wheels and I’m sure they’ll get better as the season goes on.”

Emmaus’ roster has seven seniors and six juniors, but Butz-Stavin was able to mix in a number of younger players throughout the game to continue giving them experience that will help down the road.

“They’re confident and most of them got a lot of experience last year and their confidence should be high,” said Butz-Stavin. “When you can play 17 kids, you’re doing well.”

Emmaus will host Whitehall (1-0) Thursday before playing a nonconference home game against Council Rock North (1-0) Saturday. The Lady Hornets then host Nazareth (0-1) Monday evening to open next week.